In many cancer types it is at the time of diagnosis difficult for the clinician to predict the tumour's growth and behaviour. The predictions made at this time affect the type of treatment for the patient and can therefore have large consequences for the future outcome and his or her life quality. Cancer treatment can be a hard stress, and if the patient's tumour is indolent, an aggressive treatment might actually cause more pain and discomfort than the cancer itself. To separate the aggressive tumours from the indolent ones at the time of diagnosis, and further to choose the right treatment, is a main challenge in cancer care.
Digital image analysis of cell nuclei and other structures is a useful method to obtain quantitative information from tissue. Methods can be employed that complete analysis of both isolated cell nuclei and that of the surrounding tissue. As such there is motivation to develop automatic systems that can capture these cell nuclei from the original medium, gather a significant population of nuclei and characterise them.
It can be appreciated that methods allowing the characterisation of cell nuclei have drug discovery, clinical and other medical applications.